Nikolai Raevsky. The beginning of military service as a hero of the Patriotic War of 1812.
N. Raevsky in a portrait by J. Dawe
Nikolai Nikolaevich Raevsky is a recognized hero of the Patriotic War of 1812, but few know about other aspects of his biography. Yet he lived a relatively long life for a 19th-century combat officer and died 12 years after Napoleon's expulsion from Russia.
The origin and youth of the hero of the article
It is known that the ancestors of the noble Raevsky family lived on the territory of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and entered Russian service under Vasily III.
It should be noted that, most likely, they were not Poles, but Lithuanians, that is, they were of Belarusian origin.
Some of the Raevskys rose to the rank of stolnik (steelers) and became military commanders. Praskovia Ivanovna Raevsky's (née Leontiev) granddaughter was Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich's second wife, Natalya Kirillovna Naryshkina, mother of Peter the Great. The grandfather of the subject of this article, Semyon Artemyevich Raevsky, fought in the Battle of Poltava at the age of 19, rose to the rank of brigadier, and served for a time as military commander in Kursk. Grigory Potemkin, Catherine II's famous favorite, was also a distant relative of Nikolai Raevsky (his maternal great-uncle).
The subject of this article was born on September 14 (25), 1771, in St. Petersburg. His father, Nikolai Semyonovich Raevsky, served in the Izmailovsky Regiment. He died during the Russo-Turkish War of 1768–1774, before the birth of his second son (the subject of this article), from wounds sustained during the assault on the town of Zhurzha. His widow married General Lev Denisovich Davydov, the uncle of the famous poet and partisan. In their second marriage, she gave birth to three more sons and a daughter. The subject of this article was raised in the family of his maternal grandfather, Nikolai Borisovich Samoilov. He was educated at home and, at the age of three, was enlisted in the Preobrazhensky Guards Regiment, where he rose to the rank of ensign by the age of 14.
The beginning of military service
Nikolai Raevsky first appeared in his regiment only in early 1786. In 1787, Russia entered another war with Turkey, where the subject of this article volunteered and was assigned to Colonel V.P. Orlov's Cossack detachment. Potemkin recommended that he "use" the young man "in service as a simple Cossack, and then with the rank of lieutenant of the guard." However, he did not forget his relative, and by February 1789, we see Nikolai Raevsky as a premier major of the Nizhny Novgorod Dragoon Regiment, with which he participated in battles on the Larga and Kagul rivers and in the sieges of Akkerman and Bender.
And in September 1790, the 19-year-old subject of this article was promoted to lieutenant colonel and appointed commander of the Cossack Mace of the Great Hetman Regiment. As you can imagine, the all-powerful Potemkin's patronage was crucial here, too—for an ordinary officer without connections at the highest level, such rapid promotion was simply impossible. Suvorov, for example, became a lieutenant colonel at 28 and a regimental commander at 29. Bagration achieved this rank at 29, and Barclay de Tolly at 33.
However, it should be noted that Nikolai Raevsky was a brave officer; he did not hide from bullets at headquarters and risked his life more than once – just like his older brother Alexander, who died in December 1790 during the storming of Izmail.
For his bravery and skillful, cool actions during the Polish campaign of 1792, the subject of this article was promoted to colonel. He was awarded the Order of St. George, 4th class.
In 1793, during the Second Partition of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, N.N. Raevsky was sent to Mogilev, where he disarmed the Polish garrison. For the successful completion of this task, he received the Order of St. Vladimir, IV class.
In 1794, the hero of the article was already the commander of the Nizhny Novgorod Dragoon Regiment, whose location was the Caucasian fortress of Georgievsk.
Commander of the Nizhny Novgorod Dragoon Regiment N. Raevsky, portrait by an unknown artist, 1790s.
At this time, Nikolai Raevsky married Sofya Alekseevna Konstantinova, the granddaughter of M. V. Lomonosov.
Sofia Alekseevna Raevskaya in a portrait by Borovikovsky
In 1795, the couple had a son, named Alexander, in honor of the subject's older brother, who died near Izmail. In total, his wife bore him two sons and five daughters.
Meanwhile, in the summer of 1795, the forces of the Persian Shah Agha Mohammed Qajar and the allied khans of Ganja and Erivan attacked Kartli and Kakheti. The army of the Georgian King Heraclius II was routed at the Battle of Krtsanisi, after which the victors occupied and sacked Tbilisi. Heraclius II and the Shah's brother, Murtaza Kuli Khan, arrived in St. Petersburg almost simultaneously, asking for help. Catherine II decided to intervene and entrusted command of the Russian forces in the Caucasus to the brother of her last favorite, Valerian Zubov. Zubov, unlike the utterly insignificant and worthless fool Platon, preferred to serve in the army rather than in the bed of this empress. The Nizhny Novgorod Regiment became part of Zubov's corps and in April 1796 marched on Derbent, which was captured in May. Raevsky's subordinates ended this campaign at the Kura River, when Paul I, who had ascended to the throne, decided to return his troops to the territory of the Russian Empire. On May 10, 1797, Nikolai Raevsky was dismissed.
After the assassination of Paul I, the new Emperor Alexander II recalled the subject of this article to service, even promoting him to the rank of major general. But just six months later, Nikolai Raevsky himself left the army. Until 1807, he led the typical and unremarkable life of a provincial landowner, then returned to service and found himself in charge of a Jäger brigade in East Prussia, under the direct command of Pyotr Bagration. Nikolai Raevsky participated in all the battles of the 1807 military campaign, and then fought against Sweden and Turkey. For his successes in the battles against the Swedes, he was promoted to lieutenant general, and for capturing the fortress of Silistria during the Turkish campaign, he received a gold sword studded with diamonds.
N. Raevsky in a portrait by Peter Rokstuhl, 1810s.
However, real fame came to the hero of the article in 1812.
Battle of Saltanovka
N. Samokish "The Feat of Raevsky's Soldiers near Saltanovka", the painting was painted in 1912.
On the eve of Napoleon's Grande Armée's invasion of Russia, the article's hero was in command of the Seventh Infantry Corps of Pyotr Bagration's army.
On the night of June 11-12 (23-24), 1812, Bonaparte's troops crossed the Russian border and began crossing the Neman. The French emperor had no intention of advancing deep into the country: he planned to defeat the two Russian armies (Barclay de Tolly and Bagration) in border battles, after which he would enter into peace negotiations with Alexander I, with the goal of forcing him to strictly adhere to the terms of the Continental Blockade of England.
Marshal Davout's corps, which had reached Mogilev before the Russians and occupied the city, attempted to impede Bagration's army's advance. On July 11 (23), 1812, Raevsky's corps engaged in a multi-hour battle near Saltanovka, a village 11 km down the Dnieper from Mogilev. The enemy had numerical superiority: 20 to 26 French soldiers against 15 to 17 Russians. The battle was fierce. According to popular lore, historical According to the myth, at a critical moment, taking with him his sons—17-year-old Alexander and 11-year-old Nikolai—Nikolai Raevsky personally led the soldiers of the Smolensk Regiment into the attack. He found time to address his subordinates with a pompous speech:
Soldiers! My children and I will open the path to glory for you! Forward for the Tsar and the Fatherland!
Numerous engravings and paintings were created on this subject. Here, for example, is Cardelli's engraving "General Raevsky with His Sons in 1812":
But Raevsky himself always dismissed this story as a legend. To the renowned poet K. Batyushkov, who became this general's adjutant in 1813, Raevsky told him the following:
I never speak so floridly, you know that yourself. True, I was in front. The soldiers retreated. I encouraged them. With me were adjutants and orderlies. On the left side, everyone was killed and wounded. A shot of grapeshot stopped on me. But my children were not there at that moment. My youngest son was picking berries in the forest (he was a mere child then), and a bullet went through his trousers; that's all there is to it, the whole anecdote was made up in St. Petersburg.
Batyushkov, by the way, claims that the newspaper Severnaya Pochta was the first to launch this hoax.
It was also written that Raevsky threw St. George's crosses in front of him. A surviving soldier's song also mentions crosses, but it's less pompous and more credible:
General-in-Chief Raevsky,
Itself sits on a hill.
Holds in the right handle-
First degree Egoria.
Says hear
What I'll tell you is,
Who is the bravest in our army?
I will reward you!
Itself sits on a hill.
Holds in the right handle-
First degree Egoria.
Says hear
What I'll tell you is,
Who is the bravest in our army?
I will reward you!
"The homespun truth," of course, doesn't in the slightest diminish the personal courage of Nikolai Raevsky, who was wounded in the chest by grapeshot in that battle. And the corps under his command accomplished its mission, allowing the main body of Bagration's army to cross the Dnieper south of Mogilev and advance toward Smolensk to join up with Barclay de Tolly's army.
Defender of Smolensk
The French army was rapidly approaching Smolensk. Meanwhile, the two Russian armies had not yet united, and on August 3 (15), only Nikolai Raevsky's corps was in the city. L.L. Bennigsen tried to persuade the general not to transfer his troops to the other bank of the Dnieper and under no circumstances to take cannons with him, which would be easily lost. Raevsky disagreed, recalling:
I felt too strongly that this was not a matter of preserving a few guns, but of saving Russia's main forces, and perhaps even Russia itself. I felt quite clearly that my duty was to perish with my entire detachment rather than allow the enemy to cut off our armies from all communications with Moscow.
In fierce battles, he managed to hold Smolensk until the main forces arrived.
Albrecht Adam. The Battle of Smolensk
On the island of Saint Helena, Napoleon assessed the actions of the article's hero as follows:
A fifteen-thousand-strong Russian detachment, coincidentally stationed in Smolensk, was given the honor of defending the city for 24 hours, giving Barclay de Tolly time to arrive the following day. Had the French army managed to take Smolensk by surprise, it would have crossed the Dnieper there and attacked the Russian army, which was divided and in disarray, from the rear. This decisive blow failed.
At the same time, he said that Nikolai Raevsky was “made of the stuff that marshals are made of.”
A bust of N. Raevsky in the Heroes' Memory Square in Smolensk
The battle, which began on August 4 (16) with the arrival of new Russian units, continued for two more days, but on the night of August 18, the Russian troops abandoned the city, having first blown up the gunpowder depots and bridges. Ultimately, the French suffered twice as many casualties as the Russians: 20 men to 10.
Brigadier General Jean-Jacques Pelet-Clozeau later wrote about the state of affairs after the battle for Smolensk:
The battle he (Bonaparte) desired seemed to be eluding him. Nothing was decided at Smolensk. He had conquered several regions newly annexed to Russia. The ancient State of the Tsars was untouched, neither in its territory nor in its actual forces.
On the eve of the Battle of Borodino
So, the Russian armies had withdrawn from Smolensk, and Napoleon was not at all pleased. He already realized that the campaign was not proceeding according to his plan and that further advance eastward could prove disastrous. Similar thoughts had already crossed many of the French Emperor's inner circle. General Philippe-Paul de Ségur, quartermaster of the Grande Armée, wrote:
Everyone felt they had gone too far.
He also reports that in Smolensk Bonaparte “was seized by a fever of indecision, and his gaze turned alternately to Kyiv, Petersburg and Moscow.”
General Duroc, who was present at this conversation, spoke to Napoleon about the danger of further advancement. Ségur recalls:
The Emperor answered him that he himself could see perfectly well that the Russians were trying to entice him.
As a result, Bonaparte remained inactive for seven days, and the English General Wilson, who was at Barclay de Tolly’s headquarters, sent a letter to London containing the following words:
Everything was lost, Napoleon stopped in Smolensk.
And 4 days later, having learned about the resumption of the movement of the Great Army, he sends another letter in which he joyfully reports:
We're saved! The French are marching on Moscow!
Thus, already in Smolensk, many understood how disastrous Barclay de Tolly's "Scythian warfare" tactics were for the French. But for some reason, many Russian army generals failed to grasp this, including Bagration, who complained to St. Petersburg about Barclay almost daily.
Alexander I and the aristocrats surrounding him were extremely dissatisfied with the retreat of the Russian armies. They were unaware of the real state of affairs, nor did they want to know, but they demanded immediate victories. As a result, an Extraordinary Committee was formed by early August to decide on the appointment of a new commander-in-chief. The committee included the Chairman of the State Council, Field Marshal N. I. Saltykov, Prince P. V. Lopukhin, Count V. P. Kochubey, Governor-General of St. Petersburg S. K. Vyazmitinov, Minister of Police A. D. Balashov, and Count A. A. Arakcheyev. Six candidates were considered, including people directly involved in the assassination of Alexander I's father: P. Pahlen, L. Bennigsen, D. Dokhturov, P. Bagration, A. Tormasov, and, finally, M. Kutuzov, who was given preference. Contrary to popular belief, not everyone in the army was pleased with this choice. Kutuzov's appointment was not welcomed by Yermolov and Bagration, and Nikolai Raevsky, the subject of the article, stated:
By replacing Barclay, who is not a great commander, we also lost here.
The French were not afraid of Kutuzov, as the aforementioned Jean-Jacques Pelet-Clozo writes:
The Minister of War, Barclay de Tolly, having finally decided to fight between Gzhatsk and Vyazma, began constructing fortifications at Tsarev Zaimishche. But major setbacks marked the beginning of hostilities. The people… who had kept Alexander at a distance from the theater of war blamed the foreign general. They called upon a Russian, Kutuzov, known for his defeat at Austerlitz and minor successes against the Turks, to take command.
Barclay de Tolly was indeed preparing for a decisive battle at the position he had chosen near Tsarev-Zaymishche—a location considered very favorable by many, including A.P. Yermolov, who disliked Barclay. But Kutuzov, who suddenly appeared among the troops, gave the order to retreat. Many believe the new commander did not want it to be said, in the event of success, that he had merely followed Barclay's plans.
Finally, on August 22 (September 2), Russian troops approached the village of Borodino. Moscow was too close, retreating further was impossible, and Kutuzov decided to fight a decisive battle there.
The position at Borodino was considered unsuccessful by many, including Yermolov and Bagration. Pele-Clozo, quoted above, also criticizes the Russian positions, but compliments the Russian soldiers:
The Russian fortifications were very poorly positioned. Their only merit lay in the blind courage of those charged with defending them.
He also writes that in the Battle of Borodino the Russians “maneuvered like mobile redoubts, studded with iron and spewing fire.”
Let us continue with Pele-Closo’s quote:
If the Russian troops had rested their right wing against the Gorki redoubts; if the terrain occupied by Bagration had received the fortifications that had been so abundantly built on the right flank, then all favorable circumstances would have been in their favor.
But then he praises Kutuzov:
If Kutuzov was initially uneasy; if he didn't immediately see what he should do, over the course of the day he revealed that character which constitutes one of the most valuable qualities of a commander-in-chief. His steadfastness balanced and partly thwarted the emperor's lofty considerations.
Many later authors also criticized the position at Borodino. Among them were even Engels and Marx, while M.N. Pokrovsky called the position at Borodino "extremely poorly chosen and even worse fortified." Regarding the fall of Raevsky's battery, he writes:
Napoleon took our batteries with cavalry attacks.
The positions on the left flank, the very one where Bagration died, were especially vulnerable.
Before the battle began, Napoleon had approximately 133 soldiers and officers and 587 cannons at his disposal. However, the Guard—approximately 20 men—did not take part in the battle.
The Russian army included more than 115 thousand regular soldiers and officers, about 11 thousand Cossacks, approximately 28,5 thousand militiamen, and 640 artillery pieces.
Curiously, of the 3952 Russian officers and generals, only 150 were aristocrats and wealthy landowners (the rest had far more "important" affairs in St. Petersburg and their lovingly landscaped country estates). Russian peasant soldiers and poor service gentry, whose only source of income was practically their salaries, marched out to defend Russia. Incidentally, Barclay de Tolly and Bagration were among these. Barclay, lacking the necessary funds, was unable to pay the fee for the affixing of the order's seal to the imperial charters for the Order of St. Vladimir, 1st Class, and 30 rubles for the 2nd Class, respectively. His total debt to the Chapter amounted to 890 rubles; this money was later deducted from the St. George pension funds. Bagration, who was mortally wounded in the Battle of Borodino, was left with enormous debts and only a few souls of the serfs who belonged to him personally, to whom he signed a "freedom" deed as he was dying.
In the next article, we'll continue the story. We'll discuss the Battle of Borodino, Kurgan Heights, and the "Raevsky Battery." We'll also discuss the continuation of the Patriotic War of 1812, the Russian Army's overseas campaign, and the final years of the article's subject.
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